Frequent flyer

There is a house finch inside Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport. It was sitting atop the Group 1 sign, singing, as we waited for our Chicago flight, just before everything fell apart.

I'd planned it all so well. We were flying from one small regional airport to another. There was no way to do it in less than three steps. Add in the fact that Denise has mobility issues--bad knees, walks with a cane. So I carefully planned the route, Eugene to Phoenix to Chicago to La Crosse, with at least two hours layover at each step. We'd start at 7 am and not arrive till 9 pm, but it was doable.

Songbird? More like omen pigeon. 

We were at the gate in Phoenix, listening to the birdie, when my phone announced that our Chicago flight was delayed. By four hours. Would I like to rebook?

I followed the links in the American Airlines app, found us a route via St. Louis that would get us to Chicago in time for our La Crosse connection, but only just. We had a forty minute window in St. Louis, not much more in Chicago. There was still a gate agent at our former gate, who was kind enough to put Denise into the "needs assistance" system, and also print out our new boarding passes. We walked to our new gate, had our sandwiches, and left for St. Louis about the time our original flight would've left.

There was not a wheelchair waiting when we arrived, but the Chicago gate was an easy walk, and the agent there was on the lookout. Came up to Denise and addressed her by name while I was refilling our water bottles, made sure we were first on the plane pre-boarding.

Chicago O'Hare... let's just say there's a reason we don't like to fly there. We landed more or less on time, and then taxied. And taxied. And taxied, while I watched our time tick away. Did I mention we were in the last row of seats? Also, we were arriving at gate L10, but leaving from the puddle-jumper gates at G1A.

As we finally reached the gate, the flight attendant came on the  speaker to ask Chicago folks to stay seated while those with connections got off. I was just asking the gate agent in the terminal for help when an angel of mercy with a wheel chair and a tablet showing Denise's name arrived. Took us on the long walk, from one end of the terminal to the other, watched the bears and bags while we hit the restrooms, and delivered us safely to the plane, right on time.

We dawdled a little on the runway, but at that point, we didn't care. Got into La Crosse only a little late, I collected our rental car while Denise retrieved our bags, drove to the motel and crashed. And slept till 9 am.

We made it!